get sh*t done monday

Being as today was a national holiday and all, I had big plans to sit outside on my patio to be lazy and attempt to make a dent in this ginormous magazine pile....

However, I woke up all motivated... and Home Depot was calling my name... for the third time in nine days. So back I went. 

I picked up eggplant / dark purple Behr paint swatches to debate as the potential new color of my soon-to-be-new front door. I'm thinking something less purple than "Exotic Eggplant" and more purple than "Curtain Call." Or a little less lavender than the top one. (This is so stressful!) Thoughts??

I also bought a new can of dark brown wood stain for two projects that have been on my to-do list for years that I am going to get to by the end of June. 

I also bought a pretty wildflower blue can of spray paint for another project that's been on the list since I bought my house. 

I bought more mouse traps for the attic. (These are just for mice... no rats. Pretty please.)

I bought a cool new yard tool I'll be writing about after I use it next weekend. 

I bought chicken manure to fertilize my orange tree that I fear is still in shock after getting trimmed back in January. It had flowered and there are little green wanna-be-big-oranges on it, but a lot were blown off when it was super windy a few weeks ago. And I've yet to see any of them turning orange. Here's hoping the chicken manure (and the massive soaking I gave it... shhh!) make it happy and fruity.

I also bought three more bags of my go-to Scott's brown mulch and finished laying mulch in the big rose garden and neighboring flower garden. Also fed the roses again for spring and tilled the soil around their roots so they stay as hydrated as possible under current watering restrictions. (See, I'm a good citizen. The grass in my backyard is practically dead to prove it.)

Then I got to work on the patio. In my herb garden, I planted a new rosemary plant and thyme I got at Trader Joe's last night 

I also planted a pot of lemon balm, after reading that it repels mosquitoes (who love me). It's that green leafy plant behind the candle, behind the wine on my patio table this lovely evening... :)

Since lavender also repels mosquitoes, I took some cuttings off my giant lavender bush in the front yard and am propagating that (along with some rosemary too) to hopefully keep potted on the back patio after it roots. I was inspired to try "propagating" by this article on Pinterest this morning (That's it! That's what derailed my lazy day...  damn you Pinterest! oh well!)

Finally, while at Home Depot, I walked past these cute white-washed planter crates from The Hip Gardener and decided to see if Mexican Heather will survive on my newly-painted window ledges in front of my house (ie: in direct sunlight most of the day). The planters are super-cute.. you can write on one side of them -- the side I have facing the house because I haven't decided what to write yet. (Maybe my house address?? What do you think?) I put terracotta pots inside them to hold the heather, and weighted them down with river rock pebbles so they don't blow away. I think I might need a third one.. we'll see :)